


strings of tension

by Storynerd



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Episode: s03e10 The Overlooked, Gen, M/M, Pre-Slash, Season/Series 03 Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-07
Updated: 2013-08-07
Packaged: 2017-12-22 17:30:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,148
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/916054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Storynerd/pseuds/Storynerd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'He’s sat in an ambulance with a dying werewolf, the ambulance driver’s dead body is less than ten feet away, Derek’s running around with a crazed ex-druid, and Scott’s taking on the Megazord Twins with Peter fucking Hale for backup. Stiles sighs, scrubs his hands through his hair, digs his nails in. Under all that, under the flush of adrenaline and the shakes of fear still running over his skin, there’s the underlying pulse: dad, dad, dad.'</p><p>Stiles waits in the ambulance. Having Peter there too isn't really an improvement.</p>
            </blockquote>





	strings of tension

**Author's Note:**

> "The world is all gates, all opportunities, strings of tension waiting to be struck." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
> 
> Some dialogue taken direct from 3x10

There’s a limit, Stiles thinks, to how long you can monologue at someone who’s unconscious before you have to admit that you’re actually just a crazy person talking to yourself.

Still, he’s pretty sure that losing his sanity is more of a _when_ than an _if_ at this point, so he doesn’t feel too bad at filling the silence between him and Cora’s limp body with whatever comes into his head first. (He really hopes that she’s not the kind of unconscious where you can still hear and remember what’s going on around you; she’d probably never let him forget it.) The talking helps take his mind off the worrying. Well, not off entirely, because to do that you’d probably have to knock _him_ out. But it dilutes the worry a little, eases it back from _mind-numbing panic_ to a more manageable _oh holy shit._

God, this whole night is just a mess. He’s sat in an ambulance with a dying werewolf, the ambulance driver’s dead body is less than ten feet away, Derek’s running around with a crazed ex-druid, and Scott’s taking on the Megazord Twins with _Peter fucking Hale_ for backup. Stiles sighs, scrubs his hands through his hair, digs his nails in. Under all that, under the flush of adrenaline and the shakes of fear still running over his skin, there’s the underlying pulse: _dad, dad, dad._ It’s like he’s swallowed broken glass. He grits his teeth against it and stamps down on the urge to just curl up, hide, wait until this has all blown over. His dad needs him. He can’t give up now. He refuses to consider the possibility that it might be too late. It _can’t_ be too late.

He just wants this all to be over.

Scraping footsteps outside distract him, briefly moving his focus away from the clusterfuck that it his life. He sees the vast, hulking figure of the twins’ Alpha form stalk past, the emergency floodlights on the side of the hospital throwing the mangled features of its combined faces into stark relief. Sights like that genuinely make Stiles wonder if he’s not just insane already and hallucinating the whole thing. It’s not even an unreasonable suggestion; it sure as hell would make just as much sense as the idea that werewolves and kanimas and darachs are just running around causing havoc all over town. He’s put a lot of thought into this over the past year, and really, some days he’s just waiting for the moment when he wakes up in a psych ward.

There’s a noise outside, just barely audible to his human ears (and it’s far from the first time that he wishes he’s just swallowed his damn pride and let Peter bite him, although on the scale of things he still thinks he made the right decision by _far_ ). He leans in close to the wall,  moving slowly, careful not to knock anything. If he makes any sound, he’s probably dead. Yes, definitely a noise. Footsteps. Coming closer, and he can feel his heartbeat pick up. He doesn’t stand a chance against any of the Alphas, let alone the terrible two.

Then there’s a hand pressed against the window, and he’s halfway into cardiac arrest, heartbeat thrumming fast against his ribcage, before his eyes catch up and he realises it’s Scott, with Peter half-draped across him, looking absolutely wrecked.

“Stiles,” Scott says, “Open the door.” There’s a panicked urgency in his voice, and Stiles scrambles to help him, shoving the back door of the ambulance open.

“Help me get him in,” Scott says, shoving Peter towards the door. As Stiles grabs Peter (and wow that is far closer than he ever wants to be to anyone who used to be dead), he can feel an unnatural heat burning off him. His clothes are damp with either rainwater or sweat, Stiles can’t tell, but either way the guy looks pretty awful. Stiles hauls him up into the ambulance, pressing a hand to his shoulder on instinct, feeling the tremor running through the muscles there.

“Where’s Derek and Jennifer?” Please, god, let them still be alive. Much as Stiles wants to see Jennifer dead for what she’s done, preferably in a horrifically painful way, he needs to find his dad first.

“I have to go back for them, and my mom.” Scott’s buzzing with nervous energy, and for a brief second Stiles is _painfully_ jealous of his ability to actually do something, actually _help._

“Okay,” Stiles says, squashing the jealousy fiercely, “Two problems. Kali has the keys to this thing and I just saw the twins like, 30 seconds ago.” And he hopes to god that they were headed away from here and aren’t within hearing range, because they are so very very unprepared for that.

Scott looks around, and then turns back, all strong determination in the set of his jaw. He levels a look at Stiles. “Stay here.” Then he’s pushing the door closed again, latching it as if that’ll help any against a determined Alpha, and he’s off, back towards the shadows of the hospital.

“Yeah, great, Scott,” Stiles says, collapsing back onto the bench. “I’ll just sit here and wait for Thing One and Thing Two to rip me apart.”

“Don’t be melodramatic,” Peter says from beside him. “They wouldn’t rip you a _part_. Far too messy. Most likely they’d just cut your throat open. You remember, like Derek did to me?”

Stiles turns to look at Peter properly. He’s leaning heavily against the wall, and his eyes look unfocused. “Are you _high?_ ”

“I may have predicted the effect of epinephrine on werewolves a little incorrectly,” Peter says, which seems like a bit of an understatement. His hands, where they rest on his legs, are shaking, and when Peter sees Stiles’ eyes on them he clenches them into fists to hold them still. “Desperate times, Stiles,” he says lightly, jaw tense. He looks pale and sickly. “I don’t exactly go around injecting myself with drugs every day.”

“Maybe you should, it might sort out whatever’s wrong with your _head,_ ” Stiles says, although he kind of intended that to be internal, not out loud. Peter just laughs, a quiet huff of air.

“Maybe. But where would the fun be in that?”

“Probably in the not-killing-loads-of-people area,” Stiles snaps back, dropping his head down to study his own hands where they’re laces across his lap. They’re shaking too. He tries not to think, tries to just focus on the steady rhythm of Cora's breathing. At least it _is_ steady now.

“Hey Peter,” he says after about five minutes of attempting to ignore the fact that his father is probably dying somewhere while he’s just sitting around doing nothing and relying on everyone else to save the day _yet again_ (and failing miserably at the ignoring). “How come you’re not still dead?”

It’s something he’s wanted to know for months, of course, because why would you _not_ want to know something like that? Knowing comes with many many benefits, not least of which is being prepared in case this heralds the start of the zombie apocalypse.

Look, with the way Stiles’ life is going at the moment, it’s really not that unlikely.

Anyway, the point is, he’s been dying (hah!) to find out for ages. There’s been a couple of things stopping him from outright asking. It’s not the kind of thing which just comes up in conversation, and the idea of cornering Peter alone to ask him would just be stupid and pointlessly life-endangering. But seeing as now they’re _both_ cornered by an even more life-threatening situation, it’s really the best opportunity he has.

The little whisper that says, _what if she’s already killed your father, what if it’s his life force in her veins,_ isn’t exactly dissuading him from asking either.

“I would have thought your girlfriend would have told you,” Peter says, still slumped against the wall.

“She’s not my – no, not the point, don’t distract me. Why?”

“ _Why?_ ” Peter laughs, and there’s an edge to it. “Come on, Stiles, don’t ask stupid questions.”

“No, I meant why did it have you be _you._ ” That’s nasty, and probably a little uncalled for given the fact that Peter’s been helping them all night. On the other hand, it’s his fault Stiles in involved in any werewolf business to begin with, so he’s not going to feel too bad over that comment.

There’s silence in response to that, and Stiles turns to see Peter watching him. His eyes are flickering between human and wolf, like a humming electric current. It’s disconcerting.

“What?” Stiles asks, fighting the urge to shift away. _Never show weakness._

“You’re wondering if it would work for him, aren’t you?” Peter tips his head to the side, studying him. “It’s written all over you. Interesting. Most people would want that kind of knowledge for themselves, not for others.”

“Yeah, I think you proved _that._ ” Stiles shifts so he’s facing away. It might not be wise to show his back to a wolf, but he feels more vulnerable with those eyes tracking every slight change in his expressions.

“It wouldn’t save him,” Peter says, voice quiet. “It doesn’t work like that.”

There’s something else there, something he’s not saying. “Would it have saved your family?” Stiles asks, and Peter’s eyes flash steel-blue instantly, teeth bared.

“Do you think I wouldn’t have tried that, if it would have worked?”

“Given that it’s you? Not necessarily.” Stiles rests the back of his hand over Cora’s mouth. She’s still breathing, but it’s weak.

“I suppose it would seem that way,” Peter allows, blinking his eyes back to normal. Stiles would ask him to clarify that, but the thing is, he doesn’t really want to know. He’s got the answer he really wanted, anyway.

“What even happened out there?” he asks instead, gesturing vaguely towards the hospital. “How come you’re not all roided up?”

“Accelerated metabolism,” Peter saying, pressing his fingers against his temples as he speaks. “Burned through the drug faster than I expected.” He blinks again, hard, and his fingers are shaking again. “Turns out that much adrenaline isn’t really good for you.”

“Please don’t pass out,” Stiles says, because wouldn’t that just top everything off nicely? “I don’t want to be solely responsible for two unconscious werewolves.”

“I’m touched that you care,” Peter replies, tipping his head back to rest against the wall. “God, how do you humans deal with headaches all the time? This is a nightmare.”

“Don’t be such a baby,” Stiles says, because _really._ On the scale of problems they have at the moment, a headache’s got to be at the bottom. Or possibly not even making it on to the scale in the first place.

“I’d be a little more concerned, if I were you.” Stiles gives him a frankly incredulous look at that. “ _Not_ because I think you care about my wellbeing,” Peter clarifies, rolling his eyes. “Because I’m your only line of defence should the Wonder twins come looking for you.”

“You’d protect me? How sweet.” Stiles glares at him. “I’d be touched if I didn’t think you had some kind of weird hidden agenda.”

“That’s why I like you,” Peter says, smiling. “You _are_ the clever one, after all.”

Stiles turns back to look at him properly. Peter’s still pale, still a little shaky, but his eyes are steady and calculating. “What are you planning?” Stiles asks, voice quiet. “What are you going to do to us?”

Peter smiles, and in the dark his teeth look very sharp. “Now why would I tell you that?” He tips his head, gaze intent on Stiles. Then he lifts one hand, and rests his fingers against Stiles’ cheek. They’re almost steady now.

“What are you – ” Stiles turns slightly, feeling Peter’s fingertips brush across from his jawline to the centre of his cheek. One finger is nearly touching the corner of his mouth.

“I won’t hurt you, you know,” Peter says, voice soft. “All I need you to do is stay out of my way.”

Stiles meets his eyes. The air feels thick, heavy between them. H             e swallows, goes to ask the question again.

 “What are you going to do?” He doesn’t know if he means _now_ , or _whenever your plan gets going._

Peter smiles again, and this time the edge to it has gone. “What do you think I’m going to do?” His fingers trace across, gentle, sweeping across to rest against his jaw, his lips, his pulse-point just under the skin of his throat.

Stiles finds his own hand moving to Peter’s shoulder again. His fingers grips in, and he thinks he can just about feel the _thump, thump_ of Peter’s heart. He breathes in, goes to answer –

His phone rings.

Peter drops his hand away from Stiles’ face.

 _We have a plan,_ the screen reads. 

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first attempt at writing anything for Teen Wolf, so any comments are welcome! :)


End file.
